Digging deep into the underground world of zama zamas
Beneath SA's surface lies a hidden world where zama zamas risk their lives daily in abandoned mines.
Stilfontein gold mine shaft in the North West. Picture: Jacques Nelles/Eyewitness News
702's Bongani Bingwa is joined by Kimon de Greef, a freelance writer for Ground Up.
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In the dark, winding tunnels of Stilfontein and beyond, South Africa’s illegal gold mines have become a dangerous battleground of desperation, survival, and exploitation.
Known as zama zamas, miners risk life and limb, often facing threats such as cave-ins, toxic gas, and gang violence, all in pursuit of scraps of gold.
The situation, captured in chilling detail by journalists like Kimon de Greef of Ground Up, paints a haunting picture of a shadowy underworld where hope and despair collide.
With international attention growing, including features in The New Yorker and the BBC, the human and environmental toll of this unregulated industry is impossible to ignore.
But what fuels this illicit trade, and can it ever be stopped?
"It's absolutely true that the zama zama economy tends to be extremley violent and that impoverished communities in mining towns that no longer have functioning legal goldminining industries, bear the brunt of that violence."
Kimon de Greef - Freelance journalist - Ground Up
"It's also true that zama zama activity, even though it's underground and illegal, generates a large amount of cash."
Kimon de Greef - Freelance journalist - Ground Up
While researching his article De Greef spoke to those operating in Stilfontein.
They were recently cut off from food for a week as part of a country-wide clampdown on illegal mining called 'Vala Umgodi' or 'Close the Hole”'.
De Greef says mining companies have a role to play.
"It's a requirement to close a mine that a company is supposed to get closed off on rehabilitation, they're supposed to fill up the shafts and make it impossible to get down into thesse tunnels."
Kimon de Greef - Freelance journalist - Ground Up
The issue in some parts of the country, including Stilfontein, is that some of the mines were capped, only to be blown open by the zama zamas explains De Greef.
"Another issue is that mines are bought and sold many times over so the buck has got passed many times over."
Kimon de Greef - Freelance journalist - Ground Up
Scroll up to listen to the interview or clip here to read Kimon de Greef's latest piece for Ground Up.
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